In recent years when the snowpack has looked this bad there been some river closures. The lower elevation freestones are the ones most at risk, east gallatin, lower gallatin, lower madison, the jefferson, the bighole.

Low snowpack will have a positive impact on the upper madison and the upper gallatin. It will have no effect on most of the streams.

Snow packs aren't great but it is way to early to pull a chicken little and run around saying "The Sky is Falling, The Sky is Falling!"

Snow pack is important for flows in rivers but so are spring and summer rains. Without spring and summer rain all the snow pack in the world won't help. Of course we all would like to see good snow pack but we are in the West and that is not always going to be the case. It is still far to early to be pessimistic and right now we need to hope for a nice wet spring and a cool summer.

As an outfitter in the area we have dealt with drought and warm weather a lot in the past ten years. Good water years are needed to maintain healthy wild trout populations but having less than average water years is not a huge detriment to our fisheries. If it was we wouldn't have any fish left after the drought that had an iron fist wrapped around us between 1998 through 2007!

Another side to this equation is that the snow packs throughout the state are variable with some areas with very low snow pack and others with snow packs close to or above average. If any of you are looking at traveling to Montana contact a reputable source that has experienced both high and low snow pack years before making your plans. Drought years have some advantages, especially for wading anglers.

Biggie made an excellent point about the snow pack not being the total picture. Just look at what happened last year on the Snake River as an example. The Rockies had a very good snow pack and in the early spring the water authorities drew down the dams on the Snake River in anticipation of the spring run off. Then came the unusually long and wet spring with rains coming down constantly. The result was that the dams quickly filled to capacity requiring large releases from the dams well into the summer.